I'm going to run a C25k programme for my running club

[Beakthrough]

It's partly because I believe in the programme and the benefits it brings, plus I am an evangelistic runner 🤣 but also as a recruitment drive for my running club.

The club costs £15 pa membership, the programme itself would be free.

There'd be one group session per week, probably Monday evenings, a WhatsApp group for questions and chat. Sessions would be on local trails, once we get lighter evenings.

What do I need to include in the advertising to make you sign up?

Any ideas for good places to advertise?

Social events and working as a group. That’s what would set this aside from just doing CT5K on an app

And maybe an ultimate aim, say an official 5k run in 6 months

Yes, I plan a "graduation" at parkrun, where I think other club members would come to support.

A guarantee that no one will be too slow, and that on graduation there really will be a suitable pace group to join. I’d also add to the poster that you need nothing special to start c25k in terms of of shoes or clothing as that’s a mental barrier a lot of people have

Our local run club did this recently, advertised in all the local facebook groups and they got a good turn out. They promoted it as a safe way for everyone (but particularly women!) to be able to run at night in the winter which I think helped encourage quite a few to sign up. They also did a parkrun graduation at the end.

Would you be asking for the £15 membership up front? I would do that after the programme only for those who want to continue. Or even waive the first year membership for those that wants to join after C25k is complete.

I would actually advertise a small charge to make it seem like a bargain (£10 for all 8 sessions!) then spend the funds on medals, prosecco, pizza at the end graduation

Edit- I missed that they had to pay to join the club first, ignore me

I had considered that but I think £15 is still a bargain and people don't value things that are completely free.

They'll get access to all the other club benefits, including run walk groups if they want to do their other sessions with us, and club socials. I don't think it would be right for other members not to have them as paid up members. It would also mean the sessions are covered by club insurance. I'm not comfortable running them without that in place.

Edited for punctuation.

One thing to consider would be to make clear if it’s actually couch to 5k, or couch to 30 minutes. I say that because the official couch to 5k app doesn’t actually get a lot of people to 5k - the final session is running for 30 minutes without a walk break. For a lot of new/slower runners that is only 3.5 or 4k. If you’re going to get your new runners to run a full 5k at the end of the sessions - and it’s great if you are - it might need to be more like 40 minutes rather than the 30 min the official programme allows for.

Yes, good point. I was going to run the programme as it is, but probably over 12 weeks rather than 9, to allow catch up weeks if necessary. Our last session, or maybe 2-3 sessions, depending on how the programme goes would be 30 mins continuous, then the parkrun which is 5k. I think l once you can run for 30 min you can run 5k, even if it takes you longer.

We do this as a club. No charge to them. If they finish and want to join they pay to join the club
regular runners all come and support
twice a week
parkrun graduation
a c25k Facebook group
looping and lots of it.
start in January has had best results - new year new me and all that
advertise on Facebook. We have a banner in the car park where we meet.
someof the community events we get a stall and get people to sign up.

It may really depend on where you are but where we are the running club market is really really rammed full now. If all you are offering is essentially to meet and follow a free app together once a week, and pay for the privilege, if that was where we are you’d be disappointed. There are clubs here doing that for free, one meets Tues & Thurs 8am those sessions are free, another is every Saturday morning 9am free, there’s one just started up for “slow and new runners” again weekly sessions free. These are all running clubs so I guess the goal is offering it for free in the hopes people decide they enjoy running and then start attending the paid sessions and it absolutely does seem to be working, the club I go to now has 40+ paying members at most sessions whereas last year it was more like 10.

But round here paying to do a free work out once a week just wouldn’t get any business as there is too much competition that is great and free.

I think it is different with the structured sessions, but I know what you mean. Where my sister lives there are loads of SAHM people running those kinds of groups. We're much more working class and I'm only aware of one other running group, which is a club run on very similar lines to ours.

Dumb questions maybe, but how does it work when everyone has different base fitness levels and speed? Will you all run at thr pace of the slowest person, or will you have enough people so you can spilt up? What happens if some people need to repeat weeks and others don't?

All club runs have varying abilities. We run loops, ie front runners loop back to the rear of the group from time to time.

I'll have other club members with me, so if need be, someone could stay with those who are much slower than the rest.

I've taken very mixed ability groups out before and we always make it work.

That's the other benfit of a club over a "group" qualified and experienced run leaders.

Ok so one group session, and 2 sets to be done independently? You need to make it clear if "homework" is required between sessions.

I recently did c25k with a running group, paid £10 for 10 weeks with two led runs a week. then joined the club at £35 ISH which covered England athletics membership so some insurance element.

I loved the c25k, we had a group on Strava for following each others homework runs as well as one on WhatsApp for questions. there was a graduation park run and medals and certificates for completing the course

we didn't use the app on club runs, I've did try a couple on homework runs, we would run together naturally breaking up a bit for varied paces with a few sort times from the club and they would sit walk/run at us in the beginning then we got to full runs with no walking